HSK 0 to HSK6 -> 1 month Challenges to learning mandarin

No I haven't fallen off the bandwagon... yet lol
day 10 I revised coursera HSK 1 - not sure why i did it was too easy, but I'll believe it was reinforcement, continued with vocab learning

day 11 to 15, vocab on anki, it has been slow going because I'm travelling soon and work is busy. So I plan to sue my transit and waiting for flights time to do the rest of the coursera and start on edex courses so for now just anki, only about 50 words learnt for HSK4 and still have HSK 3 leeches grrr I had hoped to have all my vocab by the 20th... not sure I'll make it so I hope I cover grammar by then and then just keep working on the vocab till month end

Still working on the words, taking longer than anticipated, mainly because 3 took longer to review and I'm only spending about 40 minutes a day on vocab. Currently only have time for anki and not much else so have begun to also shadow the speaking phrases and not just focus on characters and vocab.

Tsitsi

Vocab Reviewing going good, and slowly learning new vocab for HSK 4
Still on anki and Tuttle book, hope to ad sticky study tomorrow and well as some grammar revision soon.

April 5

Another good anki day over 500 reviews, have caught up on HSK 1 and 2 hanzi, still getting a few tones wrong but that's ok, have started on 3 now, about 1 hour

Tuttle book up to chapter 8, about 1 hour 30 min. Def helping with stabilizing my hanzi building blocks

Decided all my walking time is now learning time
Did about 200 anki reviews, being more strict with tones this time round that last time so even though I know the words and characters I'm failing them if I get the tone wrong, so slower going

Again only Anki today.

3 April barely touched anything, about 5 min anki. Just too busy at the moment  

yep some definite decay.

HSK 1 got 100%
HSK 2got 75 %

HSK3 got 65% on listening and 35 on reading and writing .... my reading is toooooo slow, it's dismal.

Todays work

mock tests: 2 hours

Vocab: 1 hour

• Decided to just continue with my anki deck, have done 303 reviews...
• also did not reset my sticky study but took pictures of last years stats - redid hsk 1 vocab
• tuttle book till chapter 1

Life happened and mandarin was a casualty. So challenge 2 was a failure.

But I was reminded that I did want to learn this language properly lol I also recently joined a Chinese orchestra and feel lost lol, so learning is paramount

My personality is that I am competitive and like setting challenges for myself; so this April I'm starting a new challenge -> Get to an HSK 4 level in a month. Why a month? coz I say so...

Day 1 figuring out my materials and resources

• I have installed lute for my reading and uploaded a ton of books
• I plan to read at least 15 minutes a day
• I have loaded my anki decks and will begin with revising HSK 1 and 2 over the next few days
• I have gotten my text book and character books ready

My main resources

1. Tuttle Chinese Characters
2. Lute and Du Chinese for reading
3. Sticky Study and Anki - refold deck for hanzi and vocab SRS
4. Grammar book - New Practical Chinese Reader plus Chinese Gramma wiki
5. Coursera courses on YouTube, EdX Beginner ad Intermediate Chinese
6. YouTube and Instagram channels that I come across when doom scrolling
7. anything else that takes my fancy... 30 days is along time lol

Some things to note for this challenge

• I plan to take a mock test before starting to see what I would score, as a bench mark and to see what I still remember. I don't think it will be that bad because I still watch a ton of Chinese drama so even with subtilties I think some decay has happened but not an astronomical amount. The past year I have done very little study, anki says less than 1 hour same a using mylingua only a handful of times for around 5 minutes
• figure out how to measure the time used, so trying to create a tracker of sorts on notion or with python just so I see what I really spend time on
• I will not actively practice writing unless I totally bored and have time to mess around. 
• I will start practicing to type on PC and not just on my phone

2hr 20 reading on du chinese, it gets easier as I go :)

Love my hsk 1 writing book, it stats with easier characters so been smooth sailing so far now at char 58

First it was camp, I did spend 30 minutes reading out there in the bundu on the du app... that's something

Then I cam back and I just could not figure out where to begin

Then a week passed...

Then I printed the first 200 characters from a frequency list -> so many new words spent some time on the first 30 or so

Then I read from Du a bit

Then I thought maybe a need a copy book, so went on Amazon and ordered a few... they arrived yesterday, So spent time on 1 characters...

To say I am behind is an understatement. Basically wasted half a month. Lets see what I can salvage in the last few days

Total Time spent

Reading: 1 hour 30 min

Writing: 1 hour 25min

Characters I can write approx 30

Well not quite nothing, I practiced one character that counts right? We are off camping tomorrow so I will take my study material with me... just not sure how much will get done over the next three days with minions in tow. Maybe I should find the characters for marshmallows and smores and write those ?

Not a bad day overall spent two hours copying script on my tablet... and then tried form memory... much harder then but we shall persevere!

So to get going again I am starting a new challenge. I've had a 3 week break so it's time to consolidate and build up areas that I did not focus on before. I will also be beginning Korean this month but real slow. I know my target speeds are ambitious... but that's what makes it a challenge

Challenge 2: Reading and writing level up!

• handwriting and typing all HSK3 600 characters in 1 month -> target speed of 40 characters per minute
• and reading well, to read an HSK 3 book by month end -> target speed of 40 characters per minute

Today I was gathering materials and making a game plan.

• Found tons of writing practice PDF's
• work on minimum 20 characters a day, writing, typing
• I will finish the HSK 3 course on coursera.
• I will work on Hello Chinese again, use sticky study ever so often to keep my vocab.
• My English typing is slow so I'll be training to touch type as well, else I'll never get to typing 40 chars a minute
• I'm going through character book reviews to see if I'll like to use any of them
• I will use learning with texts - I'll use a lot of songs I've come to love and poetry and idioms, yes this will be extra vocab that I don't know but I enjoy the material more so...
• I will use new reading sites e.g. little fox, chairmans bao, duchinese, dong chinese
• join the tadoku reading challenge
• also add anki sentences into the mix

Worked on the first 20 characters.

I actually passed LOL

Here is an extensive write-up https://www.chinese-forums.com/forums/topic/61317-my-month-long-hsk-0-to-3-challenge-experience/

Today 3 hours.

Total time put into prep = 96 hours over 32 days (had 5 lazy days)

So I put it an hour of vocab and another 2 hours of Revision videos, but was totally finished.

HSK 2 went well but was slow for some reason in the reading section so I missed three questions

HSK 3 ... well let's just say I was examined... and found wanting.

Results are out in 10 days time.. as for today, sleep!

I can safely as the first challenge HSK 1 in 40 hours was met and is easy and doable

The upgraded challenge of HSK2 in 80 hours (cumulative) I'm sure was met,.. I'll know in 10 days.

 I had hoped to have more than 120 hours towards HSK 3 but we'll see what 96 hours brings. 

Todays hours -> 8 a record right there!

The day of reckoning is here. A few more hours revision, sleep, last minute cramming and the exam will be written.

1. Vocab 3 hours 10!!! Yes I got 100% on sticky study in HSK 3!!! speed is not up to par but it gives me a better chance for the reading and writing sections  I even begun some anki sentences, better late than never LOL. And managed to keep the others green with 96% and 90% accuracy, even 86% for three!!!
2. YouTube (courses and videos and coursera vids, exam mocks, revision) -> 5 hours... yep a ton and still a few to go. I'll get halfway through the HSK 3 course I hope before the exam.

I will tally up my hours and experiences after the exam...  or Sunday LOL we'll see

Today 7 hours....

I can literally feel my brain cells popping and growing new neurons and in the process becoming entangled...

• Coursera and YouTube lessons -> 2 hours 50, wish I'd found some of these earlier... 
• Vocabulary : 4 hours 10 min -> fattening the calf at the dip

Only worked when I had meetings or calls lol, about 4 hours, the rest of the time was Chinese.. Took two HSK 2 tests today did very well in one 91/100 and 92/100 later I got 82/100 and 64/100, a lot was just silly mistakes.. tired brain? sigh...

Finally got some progress in HSK 3 words, at 82% but I don't trust my memory too much, grammar points probably only have 2 lol.

I'll try take an HSK 3 mock now before bed.. see if I can get even 30%

Couple hours later... Done with test:-> listening not bad 75/100 , reading without pinyin dismal -> 33/100

Today: 6 hours 15min

I had to take a step back and reassess, the HSK 3 vocab is just not getting in... the same words I just cant remember, so I took an HSK 2 mock test passed but not aced, so focused on HSK 2 today. Completed the Coursera course for HSK 2 and I feel more confident. Will go back to HSK 3 tomorrow, after a couple more HSK 2 mocks. HSK three is gonna just be for fun LOL aiming for 40% right now!!!

Lol work and sleep has taken a back seat. It's OK I'll sleep on Sunday.

1. Vocab 3 hours, revision of 1 and 2 and a few more words in 3
2. Coursera course 2 hours
3. Mock tests 1 hour 15 Aced HSK1; HSK 2 got 86/100 and 64/100

Today: 5 hours 20

My progress is so slow, I can remember vocab from HSK1 and HSK2 pretty well, about 95 off the bat, but 3 is still at 50%. sigh

Practiced using the app today with and HSK1 test got 100%.If only that was three, LOL

Everything feels so scattered, and the forgetting curve is making itself known...

1. 1 hour - YouTube 
2. 50 min Hello chinese
3. 3hr 30 vocab

Today:

1. YT course 1 hours 20min
2. Vocab drilling 3 hours 10 minutes

Life was till busy but managed to make strides! Got my vocab up to 50% of HSK 3 lets hope the trend continues, may yet pass 3 if only barely. Need to do HSK 2 mocks tomorrow though, and practice using the test app.

30 min Today

I don't know how but I lost tons to time to day, PC setup and life... only spent about 30minutes on YouTube Listening... nowhere near what I should and did not even manage to do a single mock yet I had hoped to do 4 today

1. 30 min YouTube HSK 3 course

Today: 4 hours

So Saturday was a wash... I got all my pc parts, and decided to build it... and no it did not take the 4 hours i estimated. It took the whole day and then some... so  mandarin study, well let's see what was done...

1. 3 hours vocab, most of it listening on YouTube videos of words, my  listening has gotten marginally better
2. 1 hour YouTube HSK 3 course

So not too bad, but def not enough...

Today 2 hours 40

Slow day

I'd happily stop studying right now... zhēn de!!! But I can't  I have 7 more days of cramming characters and phrases...

• Coursera 2 hours 20, i have skipped hsk2 and went straight to 3, sometimes doing exam prep and sometimes lessons, because I'm finding 3 vocab difficult to get for some reason... I think I've hit that slow down wall. beginners energy has flailed  exponential learning has crawled to a near stop. But I'm so close... I'll make three happen somehow.
• 20 min Vocab and Hello chinese 

Today: 5 hours 35

Ok so I tweaked my learning targets/plan a bit, because my exam centre said we can have a mock this Sunday... that's 3 days away... so I figured for me to do any justice to the level 3 test let me try get as much HSK 3 vocab in. So that's the plan try learn all words by the weekend... So I sped through the rest of the Hello Chinese Old tree! DONE, and hoping to get to 50% hsk3 words...

1. 2 hours 45 Hello chinese. Tree complete in  
2. 2 hour Vocab, > up to 28% on hsk 3 -> hitting a block with some of the words now, so thinking of doing hsk course 3 on coursera or YouTube so some of the words are in context ad thus easier to learn.
3. 50 minutes coursera -> completed hsk 1

Today : 4 hr 20 min

1. 2 hours 35 Hello chinese. Did 6 lessons, 6 to go. 
2. 1 hour Vocab, > three is going slow....
3. 30 minutes coursera 
4. 15 minutes Reading and listening on Mandarin Bean